Slient

The audience wanted new meats and they were never wrong. This is one quotation from the Academy-winning movie The Artist.


Actually, the movie cannot be simpler. It was a black-and-white silent film. There were only few characters. The story line was straight-forward, ending predictable.

Wait. If you look closer, you will notice how the film was crafted delicately. The body movement and background music were like the old times. The lighting explicitly demonstrated the beauty of the B&W picture.

It would not have been a good movie in the 1920's when the B&W movies were dominating the world. But in our age where we used iPad (and The New iPad few months later) for reading, Draw Something to deliver the meaning of the words, Facebook for communication, and 3D Movies for productions, we need something like The Artist. It picked us back to the square one, emphasizing the importance of facial and body gestures in emotional expression in acting.

That's why the Oscar committee chose the old meat this year, not only for paying tribute to the movie production in the old days, but also making a bit pulling of the over-the-top films producers back.